What is a Key Opinion Leader (KOL)?

A key opinion leader (KOL) is a member of the scientific community (person or institution) that is trusted by other experts in the same domain. KOL means "with authority in their field". KOL was created by ex-Google employees.

Go KOL: Get Expert Insights With KOLs Maps

Drive past your competitors using KOLs maps with concept granularity down to the ICD/CPT/Device code level, and the locations of external experts with city level data. Give it a try by entering a search phrase in the search bar below, it's 100% Free!

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KOL Meaning

In English, KOL, or collectively KOLs, are people or institutions that are trusted by other experts in the same domain.


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Healthcare providers take into account the opinion of KOLs when recommending treatment plans.

850 Healthcare providers were asked how they decide which brand of medication to prescribe. 90% said they take into account the opinion of prominent experts or KOLs.

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Compare and rank KOLs

Avoid human bias. The days of 'KOL surveys' and 'Expert panels' are a thing of the past. Embrace the Cloud with KOLs/Influencers Ranking and Insights produced with GPT-4 and Artificial Intelligence.

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Make smarter decisions with the leading KOL platform

Filter views on the fly with any combination of filters and targeting criteria, including Geo-location, Primary, Secondary and Tertiary conceps, company/organization, and more.

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Understand the landscape and key opinion formers

Get the full ranking signals for all the top KOLs and Influencers matching any targeting criteria. Identify who is at the distribution's head, torso, and tail. Combine our data/signals in ways that make sense for your organization and customers' needs.

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Transform how your teams look at ROI

Integrate our data into your CRM and Financial systems and build feedback loops between discovery / engagements / conversions and KOL/Influencer prominence and cost.

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KOLs for a Medical Congress

Congress season is here! Putting together a group of minds that command respect and admiration from your attendees is crucial for the success of your congress or event.

Don't rely on word of mouth or subjective appreciation. Use Kol's data backed by GPT-4 to put together your dream panel. Your event attendees will thank you.

KOL Marketing

KOL Marketing means engaging KOLs to influence the opinions of other experts, so they can then influence the opinions of the general population.

KOL Marketing is not a new idea, the principle is rooted on Psychology and dates back to the 1940s when Elihu Katz and Paul Lazarsfeld proposed the theory of opinion leadership and the two-step flow of communication.


KOL meaning in Healthcare

KOLs are particularly important in healthcare because they gain visibility through intensely focused work that often spans several years. Additionally, in academia and research circles, there is a high level of scrutiny in the form of peer reviews, committee reviews, and medical journal reviews before the scientific community can reach a consensus on the research findings; the bar they have to meet is very high. As a motivating example, please see the list of KOLs for Rare Diseases (RDs).

Opinion leaders in healthcare could come in the form of HCPs, physicians, hospital executives, patient advocacy groups, or, researchers.

KOL's technology is the definitive guide for engaging thought leaders in today's increasingly transparent environment.

KOL Can Help You Find the Right Key Opinion Leader for Clinical Trials

Using KOL's website, you can see, filter, and rank KOLs for specific ICD codes. For example:

Suppose you are interested in finding the top KOLs in the United Kingdom for Encephalopathy (G93.40). You can get a 360-degree view of the landscape by following these three steps:

  1. Find the top KOLs using the public version of KOL (geo-targeting is available):

    Encephalopathy key opinion leader example
  2. Export the influence scores by clicking on the "Download" button.
  3. Open the report you received via email and filter the view by the concepts of interest for your project. All the widgets in the report will update automatically without re-downloading the data.
  4. Optionally you can download the entire data from the report in Excel format and cross-reference it with Google Scholar.

What Is the Algorithm Used for Ranking KOLs?

PersonRank is the internal name we give to the algorithm. PersonRank computes the influence of each person for each ICD code/CPT code/Medical Device code and any technical term.

PersonRank is an objective measure of influence observations and does not employ heuristics or predictions. There's also no human intervention (or bias) while computing PersonRank scores.

KOL: Meaning

KOL Types

There are different types of KOLs and Influencers depending on the source of their visibility:

  • KOLs or Key Opinion Leaders
    • Healthcare and Lifesciences (HCPs, Researchers and similar)
    • Engineering
    • Political sciences and public policy
    • Sociology
  • Influencers
    • Social media personalities
    • Traditional media celebrities
    • World leaders
    • Industry leaders

Depending on the scope of their reach, Influencers can be broken down into four categories:

  • Micro-Influencers have a relatively small but engaged following in a specific niche, such as fashion, fitness, or travel.
  • Local Influencers are prominent figures within their city or region.
  • Vertical Influencers have expertise in a particular industry or subject matter.
  • Celebrities

How to become a Key Opinion Leader?

Developing or increasing your footprint on social media or academic circles are challenging tasks. The same general principles applies to both spaces. Follow these directions to navigate your journey to becoming a prominent KOL:

  1. " Go KOLs ": Start using KeyOpinionLeaders.com regularly to search for your colleagues, or competitors in the case of social media, by name.
  2. See the concepts they hold influence for, where in the distribution they rank, how strong their influence is and where in the map they are located.
  3. Concentrate on creating and publishing quality content around the topics you identified in steps #2 and #3 above.

 


What Is KeyOpinionLeaders.com, and How Can It Help You?

KeyOpinionLeaders.com is a free search engine that lets you find Key Opinion Leaders . You can enter any concept on the search bar at the top of this page and use it to find the top Key Opinion Leaders instantly for that concept. You can filter your results by other concepts, organizations, and locations.

  • Find KOLs with influence over specific concepts.
  • Combine any targeting criteria of your choosing, including Geo location, Sub-concepts, and more.
  • Export all the concept and influence scores for any KOL of your choosing.
  • Compare KOLs & Influencers 'apples-to-apples' on an objective-basis.
  • Get API Access to KOLs data and augment your product or service.

Companies operating in different industries, universities, and government agencies use KOL Marketing Cloud to identify and benchmark the influence of key opinion leaders. The impact of our technology traverses industry, academia, and government policy (foreign policy, public health, among others).

Download the Key Opinion Leader Mobile App!

You can gain more comprehensive access to our KOLs data by installing the Key Opinion Leader App (KOLs App), available for iPhone / iOS and Android.


KOL Meaning in English

In case you landed on this page by mistake, we provide the disambiguation pointers below.

KOL meaning in Turkish (Meaning, Translation)

KOL in turkish means " Key Opinion Leader " ( Kilit Kanaat Önderleri ).

KOL Turkish English translation

Kol Turkish English translation is " Key Opinion Leader ". On the other hand, KOL English Turkish translation is Opinion Leader ( Kilit Kanaat Önderleri )

KOL English Translations


Page reviewed by: Ana Codallo  |  Last Updated on

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